Ottawa's Caldwell Family Centre is struggling to keep up with demand.

With the rising cost of food and shelter, many people need help making ends meet. And one Ottawa community centre is struggling to meet the growing need for food services in their community.

Andrea Terry couldn’t be more grateful for the Caldwell Family Centre. She’s been living in this community for more than 23 years and says many families couldn’t get by without it.

“The meals. The breakfast. The lunches. Everything. They’re a godsend. Because when you’re strapped for cash, and you can’t buy your own food, this place is amazing,” Terry said. “I’m hoping they get the funding to keep this stuff going. Otherwise there’s going to be so many people starving.”

With the cost of everything going up, demand here is rising too.

Shelves inside the Caldwell Family Centre. (Dave Charbonneau/CTV News Ottawa)The centre’s executive director Marilyn Matheson says filling the shelves with food is hard, but getting funding for staff is sometimes even harder.

“We may have to shut our doors if we don’t get extra funding right now,” says Matheson. “Already this week, just three days open, we’ve seen over 340 families. That’s almost 1,000 individuals just at the food bank.”

The centre says if they don’t receive more donations, be it food or cash, their nearly empty shelves will be bare in a matter of weeks.

Beth McMurchy has been volunteering here for almost eight years and is also a client of the centre. 

“Parents, especially with back to school, these days we don’t have enough snacks or fruits and veggies to give them so that they can have something in their kids lunch,” McMurchy says.

And it’s not just a food bank. Residents in the area rely on free hot meals five days a week.

“We have a meal program where we make about 600 meals per day,” says Caldwell chef David Irish. “Both breakfast and lunch for the community of Caldwell and beyond.”

And for many people in the surrounding areas, the Caldwell Family Centre is the only food bank option.

“Having these kind of programs her is vital for the neighbourhood and for a lot of people,” says Terry. “Because people struggle on a daily and it’s heartbreaking to see it.”